Expecting
by The Extreme Piercing
Summary: Back inside me. Back inside me. Back inside me. Back inside me. Back inside me. Back inside me. Back inside me. Back inside me. Back inside me. Back inside me. Back inside me. Back inside me. Back inside me. Back inside me. Back inside me. Back inside me.
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer: The characters of Fiona, Riccardo, Lorenzo, Debilitas and Hewie were not created by me. They are the intellectual property of Capcom. This, I can live with.**

**I did not create the character of Daniella, either. She is the intellectual property of Capcom, also. Because of this, I cry myself to sleep every single night. It's taken quite a toll on my health.**

**No copyright infringement intended. **

**EXPECTING**

**Chapter 1**

Daniella retched into the toilet bowl, but her stomach was empty, and nothing came.

She shook with each violent heave, crouched naked on a filthy bathroom floor. The nausea eased, and she opened her eyes, blinking several times to see through tears. A single strand of saliva extended from her open mouth to the water resting at the bowl. She gazed at it with a queer fascination, this thread of phlegm stretching out before her like a strange tether, glistening, quivering with each breath.

She pulled her head away from the toilet, but the thread did not break. She turned her head from side to side, but it remained fastened to her lip, stretching as she moved. She blew at it, and it whipped about, but remained intact. She spat several times, but that only served to feed it with more saliva.

Daniella had escaped her life of servitude, fleeing Lorenzo's castle and hiding herself away where she thought he could never find her. Now she was doomed to be bound to a disgustingly dirty toilet bowl in a decrepit apartment for the rest of eternity, held here by her own mucus.

Daniella burst out laughing. She knelt there on the mildewed tiles, rocking as she laughed her breathless, hysterical laugh. It came often to her, these days.

She snatched away the thread of spit with her hand, and, her stomach settling, she climbed to her feet. She pissed and showered, then returned to the bedroom, got dressed, and began to think about what she would make of this day.

This was the third morning in a row that she was sick.

[][][][][]

Daniella was free, now. She was beyond the reach of the household that had imprisoned her. She was free of her bonds, free of her duties. But duty brought order, and structure, and in its absence, her thoughts wandered where they pleased.

Daniella would sit for hours in her chair while the light faded and the shadows glided across the room. She would emerge from whichever reverie she had wandered into, to find that night had fallen and that her musings had cheated her of another day.

Daniella often forgot to bathe. She slept in bedsheets that had not been cleaned for months, and never washed or ironed her clothes. She could seldom muster the inclination to run a comb through her hair.

Her home was a putrid hovel. It didn't bother her that the cockroaches helped themselves to the bags of refuse that were accumulating in a corner. She sat in her chair and watched them scuttling along the walls and behind her furniture. She heard them moving behind the desks and cupboards, picking their way through debris. At night, as she lay in bed, she could hear them scurrying about in the dark, but she wasn't troubled. Sometimes Daniella slept for twelve or thirteen hours a day.

When she had the humour to go outside, Daniella spent much of the day wandering through the city in which she now lived. Her flight from Lorenzo's house had brought her to this college town. She found that her appearance attracted little attention, here. The streets were crawling day and night with student types, after all. Goths and dandies and punks and hipsters who wore headbands and rastahats and black lipstick and shemagh scarves and spikes in their hair and barbed wire around their wrists; no one would think strangely of a girl with lavender hair. People just assumed she dyed it.

Thousands of people lived in this town, and she did not know a single soul.

[][][][][]

Daniella felt it gnawing at her all day. The sense that something had been missed, that something had gone unobserved.

She shambled through the streets, rambling wherever her whims took her. Daniella was a creature of habit, and usually kept to the same routes. Everyday she passed by the same bakeries and restaurants, the same bookstores and cafes, the same pubs and supermarkets. She passed by the same musicians, stood on the pavement with the same hats at their feet, waiting to receive spare change. She passed by the same homeless people, lying sprawled at the same places at the sides of the road.

They had all become familiar to her eyes. She wondered if she had become familiar to their eyes, also. She wondered if any of them had fallen in love with strange woman that passed by everyday. She was a pretty creature, after all. She imagined one of them sidling up to her, and preparing to ask her if she'd like to have a drink with them. Then they'd get a whiff of the awful odour that followed her wherever she went, and they'd sidle off away again.

She laughed suddenly, her high-pitched, fitful laugh, and she startled a middle-aged woman that had been walking alongside her.

Daniella found that she was talking to herself more and more these days. She trudged through the sea of humanity, muttering inaudibly.

She sat on the boardwalk, trying to work out what it was that was bothering her. It was a nameless unease, a sense that something was amiss, a suspicion that something had escaped her attention.

The university rowing team passed by, down the river.

Had she locked the door to her apartment? She slipped her hand into her jacket pocket; her keys were there, and she ran her fingers over their jagged edges. Was it possible that she left her door unlocked? She was thinking of something else as she was leaving. She could have forgotten to lock it.

The rowing team passed by again, in the opposite direction.

She returned home, frustrated. She hadn't forgotten to lock the door, after all. What was it that was worrying her? Something was out of place.

Nothing missed her attention when she was in Lorenzo's employ.

[][][][][]

The next morning found Daniella bent, again, over the toilet. She stared at the scum growing along the sides of the bowl. She stared at the remnants of last night's pork cutlet floating in the water.

She pushed herself to her feet. She gazed at the figure in the mirror. She drew a finger across the scaly, dried skin on her forehead and cheeks. She fingered a pimple that had sprung up overnight on the side of her nose. She stared at the filth clinging to the glass; dust and mould and dried blood and pus.

She crossed into her bedroom, and began to slowly dress. In the past, when Daniella was Castle Belli's diligent caretaker, no detail passed beneath her nose. These days, her thoughts were fragmented, her mind a jumbled mess. She tried to remember how long it had been since the blood last came.

When she was a mere homunculus, not quite a person, Daniella did not menstruate; her master had not created her that way. What use had a servant of the ability to reproduce?

But the night that Fiona Belli died, Daniella became a woman. Some time after Miss Belli met her end, Daniella was undressing when she found her underclothes befouled with blood. She dealt with it with her customary efficiency, washing herself down and stemming the flow of blood with twisted bandages.

Every problem that confronted her in her master's castle met with a solution.

She could never predict when the bleeding would begin; it could never be relied upon to at a precise time. This used to frustrate Daniella, whose obsession with detail had sustained Lorenzo's house; Daniella, who craved order and control in every aspect of her existence. The blood seemed to spite her, surprising her when she did not expect it, and keeping her waiting while she waited for it.

But Daniella no longer possessed the meticulous mind that she once had. Riccardo could have come barging through the door that very minute. Riccardo could have dragged her all the way home, but it wouldn't have made any difference. They would find little use for her; she would only be good for beating and raping. Daniella could no longer bring her mind to bear on the upkeep of a fortress. Details seeped through cracks from her head. Her thoughts were led easily astray.

Daniella idly wondered what type of house she would have kept if she returned to Castle Belli. It would probably begin to resemble her wretched apartment. She thought of Debilitas, and the clutter he would leave that would never be tidied up. She thought of the Castles great hallways and courtyards, filth and rubbish strewn throughout. She thought of Lorenzo, the feeble, incontinent bastard, sitting in his own piss.

Daniella was seized by another of her laughing fits, and then she realized that she had drifted away again from what was occupying her.

When had the blood last flowed? She remembered: in a particularly negligent bout of absent-mindedness, she had not changed her clothes for a week, and by the time she had discovered the stains in her clothes, the bleeding had already ended. That was a couple of months ago.

_Nausea gravidarum_, absence of menstruation…could she be pregnant? Daniella had never been with a man throughout her entire existence; just because she was content to live in her own filth, didn't mean she was willing to have a man rub his filth all over her. What could be happening to her?

[][][][][]

Fiona had thrashed and screamed, her pitiful cries rising to the ceiling. They would go unanswered. Her eyes bulging, tears streaking down her cheeks, snot trickling from her nose, she bucked and kicked underneath Daniella as the maid sank the glass into her abdomen. Her screams rose, and from behind the door, that contemptible mongrel howled louder and louder, but there was nothing he could do.

Daniella had taken the Azoth into herself. Fiona's essence, the reason for her existence, was now within her. Lorenzo had formed his servant from muck and filth, but with the murder of this young girl, with the attainment of that precious treasure that she carried, Daniella was now whole. Daniella was now a woman; all the emotions and sensations to which human beings are privy were now hers to experience, and all it cost was the life of an eighteen year-old child.

There was a commotion from beyond the door. Daniella heard the hateful dog whining and scrambling about, and then came a heavy thumping sound. The dog yelped and cried frantically, and as she listened, Daniella realized that the little pest was getting kicked to death.

The door was flung open. Riccardo burst into the room, and gaped wordlessly at the spectacle that confronted him. Ms. Belli lay on the ground, unmoving, half-naked, drenched in blood, a gaping hole in her stomach. Above her stood the castle's maid, equally motionless, equally silent, smeared with gore, a long, bloody wound across her midriff.

Riccardo's astonished gaze was returned by the girl's lifeless eyes. He looked at Daniella; she quietly regarded him, the child's body crumpled at her feet.

Riccardo flew into an insane rage. His fist impacted with Daniella's nose, and she was sent tumbling to the ground. She tried to regain her feet, but Riccardo's boot smashed into the back of her head, sending her downwards again.

"Whore!" he spat, incensed. She felt his boot ram into her ribs. "Lunatic! Years of work, years of waiting, and all for nothing!" He seized her by the hair, and dragged her upwards, pulling her face close to his. "What in God's name possessed you? What's wrong with you?"

A great rush of air was expelled through Daniella's nose, and Riccardo did not flinch when the flecks of blood were sprayed over his face. "Azoth," she intoned. "I am now complete."

His eyes fell to the ugly slash across Daniella's belly. He saw that both sides of the wound had been drawn together by crude stitching, as if to keep something inside. Realization came to him, and he released his grasp on her hair, allowing her to sink to the ground.

"I see," he said, straightening himself. "Well, this is unexpected, but I suppose there is nothing that can be done but to wait and see what transpires."

He turned around, and went to leave the room. "Head to your quarters and clean yourself up. I don't want that body to go to waste. Separate her into the usual components, flesh, bone, and grey matter, and store them in the laboratory. They'll make useful raw materials. Have Debilitas chuck the dog in a ditch or something."

He came to a stop at the door, and looked back at Daniella. His previous fury had vanished; there was now a glint in his eye. "Two exquisite maidens fighting over the privilege of bearing my young. My rancour was misplaced."

And with that, he was gone.

[][][][][]

Riccardo paid especial attention to Daniella in the days and weeks after the girl's killing. Every morning she answered his summons to the laboratory, and lay silently as he examined her.

"The Azoth is adapting to your body quite well," he had said, once, as he held a vial of her blood to the light. "It shouldn't be long before it becomes viable."

Daniella knew well what Riccardo intended to do once he was certain that Fiona's essence would not reject its new bearer. He would rape her, impregnating her with his tainted seed, and be reborn through the Azoth. She would cease to be the Castle's maid and instead become Riccardo's personal broodmare, furnishing him with endless duplicates of himself.

Time went by. Daniella swallowed countless handfuls of capsules, of every colour she knew. She sat uncomplaining as Riccardo plunged needle after needle into her flesh. He told her that the drugs were to prevent her body from turning on the Azoth – and the Azoth from tearing her body apart.

But as the weeks passed, Daniella began to feel changes within her. Though once her duties as Castle Belli's maid had consumed her every waking moment, they now left her frustrated and unfulfilled. Though she had never before paid them the slightest heed, the mountains and valleys that surrounded the castle began to exert a strange draw on her.

The Azoth had awoken within Daniella all the desires and cravings that abide within every human being. Daniella desired to be free; it burned within her, and she wished to leave this place as dearly as Fiona had when she was alive.

Daniella vividly remembered the night that she had left. She remembered passing by the door of Debilitas' room, and hearing his steady rumble of his breathing. She remembered the light shining in the laboratory window; Riccardo was still up and about, and she would have to be careful. If her treachery was discovered, her torture would never end.

Daniella stole as many of her master's treasures as she could carry. She wandered through the lightless halls and corridors of the castle, mechanically feeding objects into a large sack. Jewels, watches, antiques, scrolls and parchments, jostling about together in a burlap bag. When the sun rose the following morning, it shone upon the open gate of Castle Belli. Daniella was gone, fled across Europe.

She funded her journey by selling Lorenzo's precious belongings. The world outside was a demanding one, after all; even though she had led a hugely sheltered life, Daniella knew that when she was beyond the walls, she would need money for everything from food to a roof over her head. In depriving Lorenzo of the Azoth, she had taken from him something that was priceless. What did it matter if she sold a few of his trinkets and baubles as well?

He would think her a traitor. Were she to fall back into his hands, he would chain her to a stone and have her scourged until all the skin was torn from her body. From his laboratory, he would bring forth unspeakable abominations; they would force themselves upon her, and she would bear their twisted young.

She sought to be as far from Lorenzo's reach as she possibly could. She traveled relentlessly, spending days and nights on trains and buses. Every mile that she could put between herself and her master, another worry could detach itself from the wall of her mind and float away into darkness.

[][][][][]

Daniella gorged herself on the sensations of the world.

She liked to visit the movie theatres. Her preference was for comedies, and if the audience stirred uneasily every time her broken laughter rang out, she did not notice.

She visited pet shops wherever she could find them. She cut little incisions in mice and hamsters and trapped them in buckets filled with vinegar. She stuffed little birds into the freezer in her kitchen, to see how long it took for them to die.

She took photographs of the sights that she saw on her journeys. She used a camera that she had stolen from the castle. She spent hours in her apartment, poring over the pictures that she had accumulated.

Having had little choice but to make do with the tasteless bread and vegetables of the castle, Daniella now delighted in the variety of food offered by her new surroundings. She loved ice cream, especially; given to habit as she was, she obsessed over mint, and did not experiment with other flavours.

Daniella indulged her newfound emotions, lavishing her senses with every delight that she could conceive of. But there was one pleasure from which she abstained.

No man would ever claim her. She would never allow one of those revolting, sloven beasts to touch her. The mere thought of it filled her throat with bile; a depraved animal trailing hungry fingers over her immaculate flesh, smearing his fluids all over her, tainting her with his filthy seed.

She would never submit to the desire of those degenerates. But how, then, to explain what was happening to her now? She could not ignore the signs. Her mind was diseased and took great pleasure in misleading and deceiving her, but the changes that were taking place in her body were real.

Daniella sat in her apartment, the light dimming and the shadows swelling around her. In the corner of her eye she caught a flash of black; another cockroach, possibly, but she didn't care. She mumbled to herself, her forehead creasing.

There was a stranger in her home.

**The concluding part is coming soon. If I do not eventually finish this fiction, I AM A TERRIBLE PERSON AND I DESERVE TO FAIL IN EVERY ENDEAVOUR THAT I MAKE FOR THE REST OF MY LIFE.**


	2. Chapter 2

**Disclaimer: Haunting Ground/Demento and Daniella are the intellectual properties of Capcom, damn them. No infringement intended.**

**Oh, and 'Close To You' is the property of Burt Bacharach & Hal David.**

**Expecting**

**Chapter 2**

There was a very particular type of joy that Daniella had not felt in years; so long had it been, she had lost all memory of it. It returned to her suddenly, one day, soon after she discovered that she was somehow with child.

She pushed through the door of her apartment, and set down several heavy shopping bags on the nearby table. She began to unpack the contents: bleach, washing gloves, sponges, new lightbulbs, brushes, insect poison, soap, vacuum cleaner bags, washing-up liquid.

The home that she currently kept was no place for a child. Daniella set to work.

[][][][][]

She trudged around her apartment, dragging her tiny purple vacuum cleaner behind her. It trundled about on its little wheels across the floorboards, its shrill drone filling the place. The cockroaches scrambled behind shelves and cupboards, and there they waited, peering out from the darkness.

In her mind, she divided the floor into segments, and made sure that one had been thoroughly cleaned before she moved onto the next; just as she had done in Lorenzo's castle. She pushed the vacuum head back and forth in regular, even passes, and inside her some long dormant rhythm was reawakened.

Clumps of dust had gathered everywhere she looked. She bent closer, and recognized her own hair mingled with the dirt and filth, strands of lavender tangled amongst years of accumulated grime. Every speck disappeared into the vacuum.

She dragged aside the furniture. The cockroaches felt the light upon them. They scattered again, struggling feebly to find a place to hide, and Daniella felt a surge of dark, savage joy.

They felt the quiver of air about them. They felt the pull of the nozzle, the suck of air at their backs, and then they were torn from the floor or the walls, their legs scrabbling at the air, clutching at nothingness, and they were gone.

Daniella knew that the cockroaches would suffocate in the blackness. She sprinkled fragments of bread over the floor, and then vacuumed them up, as well. A final feast, in the choking darkness.

The notion amused her greatly, and she was gripped by one of her laughing fits. She giggled and squealed wildly, hoovering up breadcrumbs, her laughter twinning with the whine of the vacuum.

[][][][][]

She threw away the mattress. She knew that the thing was infested with bedbugs. She knew that when night came and sleep had claimed her, they emerged from the quilt and crawled all over her skin, suckling at her flesh. They would wobble back into their hiding places, bloated on her blood, and she would wake in the morning covered with their bites.

[][][][][]

For such a long time, Daniella had neglected to change the lightbulbs.

Some evenings she would sit in her chair while the room pulsated with light, blinking on and off, so that the apartment seemed to catch snatches of life with each burst of whiteness before the bulbs failed again and the place was thrown back into darkness.

Daniella replaced them all. She carried a stepladder into each room and pulled them from their sockets.

[][][][][]

Daniella tore strips of fabric from a bedsheet, and fashioned it into a makeshift facemask. No fumes would enter her, and poison that which was growing inside of her.

She smothered the apartment with cleaner. Fungus that encrusted the bathroom walls, liquids that had splashed across the kitchen area, stains that had gone uncleaned for years; she scrubbed at them furiously with sponges and brushes.

She sprayed the bathroom mirror with cleaner, and watched the trails of froth trickle down the surface, dislodging stains as they went. She drew her cloth up and down the glass in long, even wipes, and when she was done, her reflection stared back at her, pristine, perfect.

[][][][][]

Daniella stood in the centre of her apartment. The sun had gone down long ago. Her face was smeared with dirt, her hair tousled, her clothes rumpled, but she glowed with satisfaction. For the first time in years, her apartment was clean. For the first time in years, she had felt herself gripped by purpose, and had toiled for hours to see a task done. How could she possibly have forgotten this sort of pleasure, the most exquisite she had known during her life in Lorenzo's house?

She climbed into bed, exhausted. Outside, a pile of refuse bags awaited the arrival of the rubbish truck the following morning. Her mind was racing, and for a while, the exhilaration would not allow her to sleep.

But she did sleep.

In her dreams, an unsettling churning noise came from the vacuum cleaner. Cockroaches came spilling from the nozzle. They crawled down the hose and spewed out, a writhing, twisting mass of black. They swarmed across the floor, towards her sleeping form.

[][][][][]

It had been crafted by hand, each piece meticulously fashioned by skilled craftsmen. Chrome wheels. Clad in dark purple upholstery. Lined with emerald cotton.

It was every bit as stately as she.

Few suspected that the pram was empty as it moved through the streets. Few suspected that beneath the hood there was nothing but shadows. Daniella knew that the child was in her belly, and would remain so for some time, but perhaps it simply cheered her to pretend. And so she pushed the carriage along the pavements, through the parks, along the banks of the river. Always, a faraway look on her face; always, her lips twisted into an absent smile. Her mind brimmed with fantasies and idle imaginings, filling her with an unfamiliar warmth, and she murmured and chuckled to herself as she went.

Her eyes never left the drapes that fell over the opening of the pram. She peered into the darkness, and wondered about faces looking back at her.

[][][][][]

One could never have described Daniella as "talkative". In the years that she spent in Belli House, she had remained unwaveringly quiet and docile; Lorenzo had conditioned her as such. A maid need not be forthright. A maid need not be outspoken. A maid need only answer her master's commands, and speak in such a way that the peace of the castle not be disturbed. And so she spoke with the utmost softness, and the utmost economy.

And what use had Daniella for conversation, in those days, anyway? Of Lorenzo she saw little; the old man spent his time in the inner keep, where she was not authorized to go, and on the few occasions that he did speak to her, he expected little more than "Yes, master," or "No, master".

Riccardo loved to prattle, but the pervert was perfectly capable of carrying a conversation by himself, and she never felt the need to contribute. And so he would blather on about alchemy or history or his sexual prowess, and she would dust vases and polish mahogany and pay no attention to him whatsoever.

Debilitas, well…

The years of seclusion since escaping the castle worked their effect on her, and Daniella's ability to talk had deteriorated greatly. Her speech was halting and uncertain, and her voice barely rose above a whisper. Strange how one can live in a town with thousands of inhabitants, walk on the streets everyday with countless people, and yet not speak a word to anyone…

She had so many questions about motherhood, about the preparations a mother must make, but even if she could bring herself to ask, what friends did she have that could answer her?

Daniella was vaguely aware that she would have to sing for her child. She knew that infants screamed and wailed, and that their mothers embraced and calmed them with lullabies and nursery rhymes.

Late one evening, she sat in her chair in the middle of her apartment, the lightbulb burning above her. The shadows about the room seemed curiously rotten, as though the light cast from the bulb was somehow diseased.

"Why do birds…" Her lips moved, but no sound came out.

"Why do birds…" she tried again, but still she could not will her voice to stir. Still no sound welled up inside her throat, though her mouth shaped the words. She grimaced, and a faint anger flared within her. Could she not rely on her _own body_ to do her bidding?

She sucked in air, and tried again. Suddenly, some mental barrier was overcome, some wall in her mind was surmounted, and words issued forth.

"Why do birds…" she said, and she grimaced. Her voice sounded _awful_, harsh and discordant.

She mustered what resolve she could, and tried again.

"Why do birds suddenly appear, every time you are near?" Her voice quivered wildly, and she bitterly felt as though she had no control over it at all.

"Just like me, they long to be…" Her voice cracked, and she stopped again, her face burning.

Daniella seethed, slumped in the chair, fists clenched in her lap. She smouldered with indignation; it felt as though someone was mocking her, somehow.

Her hand found its way to her stomach. She dug her way in beneath the layers of clothing, and laid her palm on the skin underneath. The fury seeped out of her, Her eyes glazed over, and she imagined the face of an infant, gazing up at her with enormous, wide, captivated eyes.

She took a breath, and tried again.

"Why do birds suddenly appear…"

Her voice shook, but she did not pause.

"Every time you are near?"

She felt her throat begin to dry, but she swallowed hastily, and ploughed on.

"Just like me, they long to be, close to you."

Her head began to nod in harmony.

"Why do stars fall down from the sky?"

The trembling gave the words a sense of desperation, as though Daniella were uttering some sort of incantation.

"Every time you walk by?"

Her eyes flicked to the darkness in her apartment.

"Just like me…"

Shadows cast by brooms and cupboards and table legs.

"They long to be…"

Were demons lurking there?

"Close to you."

Did they want her child?

"On the day that you were born…"

Were they waiting for her child to be born?

"The angels got together…"

Would they seize it and steal it away from her?

"And decided to create a dream come true."

Would the words banish them?

"So they sprinkled moon dust in you hair of gold and starlight in your eyes of blue."

Would she have to keep singing them?

"That is why…"

If she stopped, would the demons come out again?

"All the girls in town…"

Would the singing never end?

"Follow you…"

Would she be holding her child forever?

"All around…"

Would she be singing lullabies forever?

"Just like me…"

Forever eyeing the shadows?

"They want to be…"

Forever keeping vigil?

"Close to you."

The words took on that particular quality that occurs when lips curl up into a smile. The longer she sang, the stronger and more assured her voice became. Soon, the words mingled with titters and giggles, and Daniella began to cackle madly, sitting alone in her room late at light, song forcing itself out between fits of laughter.

[][][][][]

What strange feelings the girl, Fiona, had awoken in her, all those years ago. What a maelstrom of want and revulsion and guilt and disgust and hunger and jealousy and admiration and longing.

It was the presence of the Azoth that prompted such emotions; of that, Daniella was certain. Humanity, dangled before her in the form of a young girl. The promise of peace, of fulfillment.

She wanted to draw the girl close to her. She wanted to envelop her, graze her skin with her lips, smother her sobs and whimpers with shushes in the dark.

She wanted to seize the little bitch by the throat, and feel it collapse beneath her fingers. She wanted to hold the girl in her arms as she fought and squirmed and struggled and the life seeped out of her. She wanted to tear chunks of flesh from her filthy body with her teeth. She wanted to devour every chunk of her, so that there would be nothing left.

Daniella only understood it now. She could only make sense of it after all those years.

Daniella had wished to possess Fiona Belli utterly. She loved and hated and desired her so much that she could only be satisfied if she owned every speck of her.

[][][][][]

The presence of her child was apparent, now, and her belly had swollen.

Daniella knew that there were tests that she could take to determine the gender of her child. A doctor would slather her belly with gel and press a transducer against it, and the image of a foetus would flash on the screen in ghostly green and grey.

But in order for this to be done, Daniella would need to visit a surgery. She would need to brave waiting rooms, and talk to secretaries and nurses, and answer questions about medical history, and fill out application forms, and endure human beings and their idiotic chatter…

If the child was a boy, she would name him Antoine. If it was a girl, she would name her Monica.

[][][][][]

It amused Daniella greatly that so much of the food that she ate these days found its way into her child's belly.

She sliced off pieces of chicken with her knife, and dipped them into the sauce. She tore chunks of bread from the loaf, and wiped the plate with them. With each mouthful, she quietly scolded her child for stealing her food.

[][][][][]

The light glared far too brightly. The bulb dangled above her, glowing, infuriating, far above her. She would have given anything to snatch it in her hand, and tear it from the ceiling. But it was beyond her reach.

She lay on the blanket that she had spread on the floor. By her side, she had set all the items that she _thought_ she would need. A kettle, its power lead snaking across the floor and entering a socket on the wall. A stack of towels. A tray of moist napkins. A pair of scissors.

It wasn't enough. For one thing, she dearly wanted a crossbow to destroy that lightbulb.

She had worn a nightgown, but the thing had become soaked through with sweat and clung to her skin, and she had to fight her way out of it. It now rested underneath a table where she had flung it in a fit of exasperation. She lay in the centre of the apartment, the walls towering above her, gasping for breath, her skin slick with sweat, glinting in the light.

She cast a baleful eye at the shadows. The demons were laughing at her.

The pain came in waves. It grew within her, building and building. She seized up, her back arching, handfuls of blanket grasped in her fists. The agony mounted, and she thrashed about, snorting furiously, eyes squeezed shut. She rocked up and down, scrabbling at the floor, twisting her hair with her fingers, and making great effort not to scream. At last, the pain would abate, for a time, and Daniella would lie there, whimpering and mewling.

Her hair was stuck to her skin, slimy lavender tendrils wriggling about her face. Her eyes darted around the room, and came to rest on the clock by her side. It told her that it was half-past ten. Daniella's heart sank; it was half-past ten every time she looked at the damn thing. Had the batteries run dead while she was giving birth? How long had she been in labour?

She swatted at the clock with her hand. It skidded across the floorboards.

Daniella noted a growing pressure in her bowels, and misery began to wash over her. She was scarcely able to move, and staggering all the way to the bathroom was completely out of the question. She hadn't thought to prepare for this…

The next contraction came, and she collapsed backwards. For most of Daniella's life, pain had been an abstract notion, a fascinating spectacle that was exhibited by other living beings. She did not know to steel herself as the agony approached. She did not know to breathe steadily, and to keep her mind on such time as when the pain has passed. She knew only that her body was in the grip of complete torment, and so she squirmed about, crying out into the emptiness of her home, drool trickling down her face.

The contraction passed, and Daniella noted a soft, warm feeling spreading over her legs. Tears streamed down her cheeks, and she began to sob uncontrollably, overcome by a sickening sense of defeat.

From the darkness in the apartment, the demons began to laugh and jeer.

Daniella lay on the floor, covered in her own sweat and shit. She stared vacantly at the ceiling, and then her eyes came to life again as the pain returned and flowed into her.

**Go to Youtube**

**Type "close to you" and "Mirrormask" into the search bar. **

**Watch the video**

**Pick yon jaw off the floor.**

**Turns out this fiction is going to run to three chapters. I sincerely hope that this chapter wasn't just filler. It was something that I really wanted to write, and I'm not just trying to pad out the story. With luck, I'll have the conclusion up soon. **

**Thanks a million to those that left reviews.**

**Glad sissyHIYAH liked the bit about the mint ice cream. I wrote several drafts of the story, just to get it right, but the mint bit was just included at the end as an afterthought. There's no telling what readers will respond to, eh?**


	3. Chapter 3

**Disclaimer: Haunting Ground/Demento and Daniella are the intellectual properties of Capcom, confound it. No infringement intended.**

**EXPECTING**

**Chapter 3**

"Lorenzo crafted you well, didn't he?"

Riccardo was not the type of man that required alcohol to overcome any sort of shyness or self-consciousness or restraint. He did not require liquor to free himself from inhibition.

There was not a drop of alcohol in Riccardo when he related to Daniella, with unabashed frankness and in gruesome detail, his exploits in the brothels of nineteenth-century Toulon.

There was not a drop of alcohol in Riccardo when anger overwhelmed him and he twisted Daniella's fingers about until shards of bone protruded through her skin.

Riccardo was completely sober when Daniella caught him, one day, bearing a girl in his arms up the stairs towards his chambers. The child could not have been older than ten; she did not stir, and Daniella could tell that she had been drugged.

"It may be that a gypsy family will come knocking at the door, in search of their missing daughter," Riccardo had solemnly intoned. "We have not seen her."

Riccardo had no need of alcohol to allow his 'true' self to emerge, for the simple fact was that the man was utterly without shame.

However, Daniella had learned that, when he was sober, Riccardo could at least be succinct and to-the-point; qualities that she appreciated in an individual. It was obvious that Riccardo disliked her intensely, and was pained to be in her company, and as a result he usually dealt with her as brusquely and briefly as possible.

It suited her.

Unfortunately, this night Riccardo was on his fourth glass of wine.

Daniella felt his gaze on her as she moved around the room. He lounged across the settee in the centre of the room, and held forth on any topic that came into his mind: philosophy, alchemy, biology, the damned idiocy of that old fool Lorenzo, geography, the art of love, until finally she herself found herself the focus of his blather.

"You're flawless, to the eyes," he said. Daniella ran her duster back and forth along the mantelpiece, and said nothing. "I've seen it, myself. I've seen every inch of you, did you know? I saw you before Lorenzo gave you the spark of consciousness. You were lying on a stone slab in a laboratory, lying there utterly lifeless, like a piece of meat, a corpse."

He sniffed. Daniella formed her mouth into an 'O' shape and blew a speck of dust from a candlestick.

"I searched for some mistake that the old man might have made. Some imperfection that he left in you. I examined every part of you. I turned you over, I looked everywhere, but you're utterly perfect. From an aesthetic point of view. Lorenzo excelled himself."

The flowers in the vases were rotting. Daniella withdrew them, and made a mental note to fetch fresh ones from the gardens.

"Not a blemish on your skin, though I looked and looked. No part of you is prominent, not your legs, not your hips, not your eyes, not your chin, not your breasts. They're all of a whole. Perfect poise. Such refinement. So tasteful."

A painting hung above the fireplace: a beach, stretching into the distance beneath laden skies. The tide is out, and a wrecked ship lolls half-devoured by the sand. Daniella ran a cloth over the frame. Mahogany.

"What I do not understand," Riccardo continued, "is this. Where is the point in going to so much trouble to create such a beautiful servant, without giving her a hint of life?"

Riccardo shifted on the couch. "You're utterly striking to behold, as much as any woman I have ever met, but it is all meaningless. Your beauty, your faultlessness, it's all worth nothing, because you're naught but a frigid, lifeless bitch. Women need warmth, and passion, and imagination, and fury, and terror. That's what I look for in a woman. That's what inspires me! You need to be able to evoke these feelings in a woman, for them to be worth anything at all."

Shovel in hand, Daniella began to remove piles of soot from beneath the fire grate.

"Does it bother you at all, Daniella? Does it trouble you that you're such a dry, hollow little doll?"

Her voice was faint. "I couldn't say, sir."

Silence prevailed for a moment, and Daniella began to wonder if she would have peace for the rest of the afternoon.

"Daniella," he said. He was motioning to the chair opposite the settee. Daniella set the shovel down by the fireplace, and walked over to the chair and sat down.

Riccardo fixed her with his stare. A moment passed, and he said: "Tell me about the girl."

"Sir?"

"Fiona. I want to know how she died."

Daniella, hesitated, uncertain, and then she said: "I killed her in the boiler room. Sir saw what was left of her."

"I want you to tell me about the events that led to her death. How did you discover her? How did you trap her? What did she do?"

Daniella cast her mind back to that night. "I found her hiding in a wardrobe in a bedroom in the east wing. The dog leapt on me, and Miss Fiona was able to escape. I chased her along the outer passage, and outside into the gardens. I followed her into the fountain garden, and I found her hiding behind a hedge. I pursued her along the walls, and followed her through the kitchens and into…"

Riccardo's eyes rolled to the ceiling. "No, no, no, no, no! Don't you know how to tell a story?" he asked, exasperated. "How was Fiona behaving? Tell me how she reacted as you chased her down relentlessly, with the intention of murdering her in an excruciating fashion?"

"She was afraid."

"And how did she express this fear?"

"She was crying."

"Yes, go on!" he urged her.

"She begged me not to hurt her. Sometimes I lost her, but I heard her crying and I found her again."

A smile had appeared on Riccardo's face. "Continue. Did you hear her begging God out loud to save her?"

"Yes."

"And a lot of good that did her. What did her voice sound like? Was she almost unable to get words out, for all the sobbing and crying?"

"Yes."

Riccardo nodded vigorously. "Did it sometimes seem as though all reason had fled from her? Did it seem like her wits had abandoned her? Did she flounder about in a confused daze, that mongrel jumping and yapping about at her heels?"

"Yes."

Riccardo's eyes were filled with light. "Alright. You cornered her in the boiler room. What was that like?"

"Miss Fiona was afraid."

"Was she cowering in a corner?"

"Yes."

"It must have seemed as though she might have gone entirely mad with fear."

"Yes."

"Did she wring her wrists in that dainty way that certain females have?"

"Yes," said Daniella, slightly bemused by Riccardo's insight.

"Could she barely speak, such was her terror?"

"Yes."

"Alright. What happened next?"

"I fought her to the ground. I tore the cloth from her belly, and I cut the Azoth from her flesh."

"How did you manage that? Did she not fight you?"

"Yes, but she was not very strong."

"How did you overpower her?"

"I rested my weight on top of her," she said, and Riccardo mouthed a captivated "ah!".

"Did she struggle?"

"Yes."

"It must have seemed as though she had lost her mind!"

"Yes."

"Was there a type of…well, I don't know…_conflict_ within her?"

"Sir?" she asked, confused.

"You were attempting to murder her, but when she looked in your eyes, was there a suggestion of _longing_, of _pleading_, as though you might at the same time be her saviour? Did she perhaps believe that there was a hint of love in you? Was there the hope in her that you might show her mercy?"

Daniella thought for some time. Fiona's face flashed before her; once again, the girl's frantic, beseeching eyes met hers.

"Yes."

"I see. I've seen that on more than one occasion." For a moment, Riccardo seemed lost in thought. "And then you cut into her with the glass. What did she do then?"

"Miss Fiona began to scream."

"Did her eyes bulge?" Riccardo looked at her through circles formed by his thumbs and forefingers.

"Yes."

"Did she twist and writhe about beneath you?" Riccardo licked his lips.

"Yes."

"Could she sometimes not scream at all, because she couldn't catch breath?"

"Yes."

"Her face must have contorted into the most ridiculous shapes."

"Yes."

"It usually happens. People lose all sense of dignity when they're about to perish. And they let out the most laughable wailing, as well. What did her screams sound like? Utterly without grace and elegance, I'll wager."

"Yes."

"In your view, Daniella, in the end, in her last moments, was Miss Fiona devoid of fear? Did it seem as though awareness had left her, and there was nothing left but agony? No fear, no longing, no feeling at all. Only pain?"

Daniella remembered Fiona, her face warped, her skin white, her eyes protruding. Daniella was a convincing imitation of a human woman, but as she died, Fiona seemed a distorted parody of a woman, not human at all.

"Yes."

Riccardo sighed, and seemed to sink into the settee, strangely contented. He peered at Daniella intently. "You witnessed a remarkable thing, Daniella. That young girl wished to _live_; she wanted it more than _anything_. The will to live; the desire to endure and to avail of the delights of this world."

"Yes," he continued, nodding. "The will to live. Fiona was terrified. Never in her brief life had she been confronted with such madness, such horror. But the will to live, it drove her on. It compelled her to flee through the corridors of this house. It drove her to hide in the darkest, dankest corners of this place, to avoid capture. The girl was not brave, of course. It's quite clear that she was a sniveling coward; we all saw that. But the girl wished to live, she wanted it _so much_."

Riccardo laughed softly, and looked at Daniella. "That is what's missing from you. You couldn't care less if you lived or died. Am I correct? If there was no one around to tell you what to do all the time, you'd just sit there, wouldn't you? You'd sit there until you rotted away. Isn't that right?"

Daniella looked at him. "I couldn't say, sir," she answered.

Riccardo snorted, and turned his attention to the ceiling. Daniella resumed cleaning the room.

[][][][][]

The world imposed itself, and Daniella snapped out of her reverie.

She had stumbled into fantasies of the past, again. She had been thinking about a conversation Riccardo had forced her to have; he had blathered on about something to do with the "will to live", but she did not remember much of what he had said. She was certain, however, that not long after that discussion, she had left Belli House, with no intention of returning.

She looked about, and found that she was standing in the centre of the front room. The light from the window had almost dwindled to nothing, and the place was entirely dark; evidently, she had been lost in thought for some time.

Against the dim light that remained in the window, Daniella could see the silhouette of a lamp. She made her way over to it, and on the way her foot brushed against something that was lying on the floor. She fumbled about in the gloom, and eventually her fingers found the switch. She turned the lamp on, and the place was filled with light.

The entire room was in disarray. Daniella passed her eyes over the cupboard; it had been dragged from the wall, and now stood at an awkward angle. She saw the chairs, positioned strangely around the place. She saw the fragments of porcelain on the floor; they had fallen there after a plate had been dashed against the wall.

Daniella remembered. A thin smile appeared across her face.

Daniella remembered the fury that had consumed her. She remembered the savage visions and thoughts that had burned in her mind.

She remembered stalking through every room in this place. She remembered how the air had filled with her shrieking and screeching. She remembered flinging objects at the walls. She remembered pulling furniture aside. She remembered glaring into shadows, searching for the object of her rage.

She remembered standing in the middle of the room, amidst all the disorder she had wrought. She remembered how her body had trembled with anger. Somehow, her thoughts strayed, and she became lost, drifting through memories. She must have stood there for hours, unmoving, engrossed in the past.

Daniella heard a soft scuffling sound, and her head turned to the dinner table. It stood in the corner, and as she looked at it that moment, it seemed charged with a kind of promise.

Slowly, she walked over. She bent down, one knee coming to rest on the floor, then another, and then she got down on all fours, her lavender hair tumbling down from her shoulders. She gazed into the darkness underneath the table, searching past the jungle of wooden legs.

Monica was crouching in the shadows.

Daniella's lips cracked open in a smile. "You may come out, Monica," she said, softly.

The girl peered out from the shadows, her eyes wide.

"Mummy isn't angry anymore."

[][][][][]

The thread to heaven had been broken, and all joy was fled from her.

Daniella felt as though a veil had been torn from the world. Every pleasure that the senses could bring her had been exposed as an illusion, and now she could not find delight in anything. Food rested like clay on her tongue, and fought its way down every inch of her throat. Every scent that reached her nostrils sickened her; every type of sound that she heard, music, words, the city, accumulated painfully in her head, a growing clamour that filled her skull with noise until she felt as through it would explode.

All the epiphanies that Daniella had gathered in her short life had been rendered so mundane and meaningless. The promise that the world had held, the possibilities that had lured her from Lorenzo's castle, had vanished.

[][][][][]

No other human being was present to witness Monica come into the world. She arrived in the dead of night, and her mother had delivered her by herself. Daniella alone had drawn the child from her flesh. Daniella alone had braved agony and exhaustion. At last, the apartment was filled with cries, and Daniella brought the infant close to her.

A chill coursed through the new mother.

The girl's hair was sodden and slick with blood and mucus and whatever else had followed her into the world. They clung to the side of her tiny head, curling about the skin, glinting in the light: strands of blonde hair.

The demons in the shadows began to chatter. Lying sprawled in the centre of the floor, her strength spent, her baby clutched to her chest, Daniella was seized by the most inexplicable dread.

[][][][][]

Monica watched her mother open the fridge door. It resisted her hand for a moment, before swinging open with a jerk. Mother took out a carton of milk, and then shut the fridge again; the door fastened into place with a dull sucking sound. Mother opened the cupboard, and withdrew a glass, which she set on the counter. Mother twisted open the carton of milk, and then poured its contents into the glass. Mother returned the carton to the fridge, and wordlessly handed the glass to her. There was a crack in the side of the glass, but it was so fine that neither of them noticed it.

Monica put the glass to her mouth, and it broke apart. A jagged shard sliced its way through her lower lip, and she screamed as pain rushed through her. The tumbler impacted on the kitchen floor, and milk and glass sprayed across the tiles in every direction.

Monica knew that cries angered her mother, but she had not yet the strength to stifle them. She stood in the middle of the kitchen, shaking with sobs, milk and blood streaming from her mouth and down the front of her shirt, arms hanging uselessly at her sides.

A shadow fell across her face; her mother was leaning in close. Daniella stared at her daughter, and a sneer took shape in the corner of her mouth. So obnoxious, the way the girl's face scrunched up; so unappealing, the way her skin reddened; so revolting, the way tears and snot mingled with blood and milk and dripped from her chin down to the puddle at her feet.

"Hmmm…a thief is betrayed," she murmured. "You try to hide it from your mummy, don't you, Monica? Such a lovely, innocent face. Such a fine little actress. But you don't deceive me, young woman."

"You thought you could steal all my feelings, but you were too greedy! You filled herself with too much treasure, and sometimes it comes falling out."

"Cry and cry and cry, Monica. Cry so hard you cannot breathe!" Daniella started to laugh, trembling with deranged mirth. A finger found its way to Monica's face, and traced the length of the glistening trail that fell down her cheek. "Tears for when your belly hurts. Tears for when your toys break. Tears for when the cold won't let you sleep. Tears for when the door closes on your little hands."

Daniella's nostrils flared, her eyes blazed with rage, and her face filled her daughter's sight. "I know you did it!" she hissed, her teeth clenched. "Did you think I would not know? Did you think you could steal from me? Did you think you could take my life and that I would never find out? Do you think mummy is an _imbecile_?"

Her voice swelled with fury. "You cry in your bed. Do you not think I hear? Do you not think that I know what you have done? When you are hungry, it is because mummy can't be. When you are scared, it is because mummy can't be. When you are cold, it is because mummy can't be. You stole it from me! Do you understand, you little _thiiiiiiief_? You stole it from me! It was mine! It was mine!"

[][][][][]

Monica knew walls and ceilings.

Monica knew wooden floorboards and drawn curtains.

Monica knew cracks in plaster and clumps of dust that tumbled across the floor.

Monica knew the blare of horns and the call of voices and the tap of feet on stone. Such sounds found their way into the apartment that she shared with her mother. They came from beyond, passing through the walls, and Monica would wonder about that strange world that existed outside.

Monica did not go to school. Her mother would only bring her out when night fell. They marched down streets and lanes, a hand firmly clasped in the other's. The pavement cracked and buckled beneath Monica's feet, disorientating the girl. Cars would pass by, blinding her with their light. The cold would finger its way through her clothes, and she would feel weak. Sensations would swirl about her, and she would struggle to maintain her balance.

Mother sometimes became irritable when she could not keep up.

[][][][][]

Monica knew beauty. She saw it in her mother: flawless, sublime, forbidding, unattainable.

Often the light left mother's eyes, and she gazed vacantly into nothingness. Monica would gorge herself on the sight of her, then. She studied every inch of her.

Sometimes, mother would be overcome with tiredness, and would fall asleep in her chair. Monica would walk over, and stand gazing at her. She would run her fingers through her mother's lavender hair. She would put her little nose to her mother's face, and breathe in the scent of her. She would trace stubby fingers along her cheeks, across her lips, down her throat. It was the richest feeling that was hers to experience.

Monica was a wanton child. She indulged the few sensations that were available to her.

[][][][][]

Monica knew madness. She felt it in her mother's laughter.

Monica and Daniella ate dinner together. There would be nothing but the clink of knives and forks on plates and the squelch of food in mouths, when suddenly mother would burst into giggles across the table. She would sit there, trembling with demented mirth, food dripping from her lips.

[][][][][]

Monica knew fury. She saw it in her mother's eyes.

Mother became angry when Monica cried. When Monica became hungry, or cold, or when she felt pain, she tried her best to conceal it from her mother, but it was difficult.

Sometimes she would lie curled up in bed, late at night, weeping softly into the sheets. She would hear the stamp of feet on the floorboards. She would hear the door of her bedroom being flung open. The blankets would be torn from her, and she would look up.

"You are _crying_ again, Monica." Her mother would loom above her, a terrible silhouette in the gloom. "I can hear you through the walls. May I not have some peace? Are you not happy with all you've stolen from me?"

Daniella would glare at her daughter, lying before her on the mattress. She would shake with rage, gulping at the air. "Stand," she would say, and Monica would hesitate.

"_Stand_!" she would screech, shattering the peace of night, and Monica would leap to her feet. She would stand awkwardly on the mattress, shrinking from her mother; tears rolling down her face, incriminating her.

"I know you do it," her mother would spit. "You know that it makes mummy angry. That is _why_ you do it, isn't it, you little beast?" Mother would begin to cackle madly. "You mock your mother! You take my light, my feelings, and then you flaunt them before me! You _animal_, first you steal from me, and now you laugh at me! Do you want to make mummy sick, is that why you do this? Do you want to make mummy entirely mad?"

[][][][][]

Monica knew the passing of shadows across the room.

Monica knew the ticking of the clock on her dresser.

Sometimes Monica slept for sixteen or seventeen hours a day. Daniella prepared meals whenever her daughter told her she was hungry. Strangely enough, her daughter's requests for food never angered her; she simply set to work, shuffling about the kitchen.

Sometimes Monica withdrew into herself. Her mind was sparse. She would slump against the wall of her bedroom, and lose all awareness. She did not become lost in thought; she simply drifted away.

When Monica was six years old, she began to masturbate. It was another sensation for her.

One day, Daniella knocked on Monica's door, and entered, a stack of linen in her arms. She looked about, and saw her daughter crouched in a corner, her hand reached between her legs.

Daniella stared at her child, her face impassive. Monica lifted her head, and looked dully at her mother. The two held each other's gaze for some moments, and nothing at all passed between them.

[][][][][]

Daniella always resented Monica for not having lavender hair.

It always seemed to Daniella that her daughter was slighting her. It began the moment Monica was born. She remembered when she set eyes on her child for the first time. She remembered the blonde locks sticking to the side of the infant's head. She remembered the sickening feeling that seeped into her.

During her pregnancy, Daniella had indulged often in fantasies about her child. She had imagined it as a boy, a girl, a baby, an infant. She had floated through countless blissful scenarios. But she was always convinced that the child's hair would be exactly the same colour as her's.

Daniella endured a long, painful labour, and beheld her daughter. She saw the golden hair on the child's head, and countless dreams scattered like ashes.

As Monica grew, Daniella became constantly suspicious. She could never rid herself of the feeling that she was being made fun of.

The light would strike her daughter's hair in a particular way. Golden light would shimmer, and Daniella would seethe.

When Monica was five years old, a hint of freckles appeared on her face. Daniella felt the queerest affront. Her skin was perfect; such was her design. Was Monica insulting her? Was she trying to tell her that she wanted to look nothing like her mother?

Such subtle ways Monica had of tormenting her mother. How cruel she could be.

[][][][][]

Shadows passed across Monica's face.

She sat in her room. The hours passed, and she did not think.

But in her mind, minor disturbances took place. There was no telling what caused this. However, memories became dislodged, and floated up into her consciousness.

Monica's face twitched.

_Desperate flights through darkened corridors._

_The howling of a dog._

_Her mother's laughter, but in an unfamiliar place._

_A man, a sadistic smile, deep scars across his face._

_Crouching down in grime and darkness, praying to remain unfound._

_The lurching terror of discovery._

_The desperate desire to remain alive._

_The awful yearning to be safe, to be away. To escape._

Just as quickly as they had made themselves known, the memories sank back into the murk. Monica's head rocked back, and she sat, unmoving, her eyes empty.

[][][][][]

Time goes by.

Dark stripes of sandy brown began to work their way through Monica's golden hair.

Daniella watched as her daughter grew older. She watched her face change. She began to doubt what she was seeing.

Eventually, however, her uncertainty faded. When Monica was nine years old, Daniella became sure that she had known this face before.

Daniella knew little of alchemy. Her purpose as the maidservant of Castle Belli was to dust and cook, and Riccardo would have roared with laughter at the suggestion that he might take a homunculus servant on as an apprentice.

But she supposed that what she suspected her daughter to be was possible. Sometimes, the will to live, the desire to endure, could not be destroyed.

It made no difference. Nothing had changed.

Azoth was life. Azoth had given Daniella every pleasure that the world contained, and Monica, or Fiona, or whoever it was that crawled out of her womb, had stolen it from her.

Azoth was life. Monica could not yet create life; she was, as yet, too young to bear a child.

Daniella would wait until Monica was ready. Daniella would wait until her daughter was able to grant life. Then, Daniella would be able to retrieve that which was taken from her. Daniella would once again have the life, the warmth that was torn from her when she brought her child into the world.

When the blood came, Monica would die.

Daniella sat motionless in her chair, deep in thought. The door to her daughter's room was closed, and not a sound came from the room beyond.

Daniella remembered when she was pregnant with Monica. She remembered how giddily excited she was, in those days. She remembered hours passed in blissful dreaming, fantasizing about her child.

Daniella knew that when she regained the Azoth, all the human emotions that she had lost would be restored to her. She absently wondered if she would miss Monica. She wondered if, when her daughter was dead, she would love her as she was unable to do when she was alive.

It didn't matter. All that mattered was that this torture would end, in time. All that mattered was that she would be complete again.

Daniella sat in her chair. In the next room, Monica hunched on her bed, oblivious to all. The hours stretched before them.

**THE END**

**It can't be! But it is! I've actually seen a fic through to completion. Will wonders ever cease?**

**I wanted to write a different story **_**so badly**_**. I wanted to write a fluffy piece where Daniella is able to love her daughter and the two have a beautiful life together. But I just couldn't buy into it. **

**Many, many, many thanks to sissyHIYAH, HazardousRaptor and futomaki007 for keeping me going with their reviews.**

**Sorry if you were hoping for a happy ending, people.**

**Reviews/feedback are greatly appreciated. In the **_**highly**_** unlikely event of people having trouble understanding what happened in this story, I may post clarification in the reviews section.**


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